Social Workers (Hansard, 22 February 2000)

§ Mr. Hutton

Although vacancy rates for social workers are among some of the lowest for a decade, we are concerned that social workers must be available in the 905W right numbers if we are to deliver the higher quality of services that users and their carers deserve, and if we are to make a success of vital new initiatives such as Quality Protects.

It is the responsibility of local authorities, as employers, to ensure that they have sufficient social workers who are competent and safe to practise. It is a matter for each local authority to consider whether a possible answer to an immediate recruitment difficulty is to recruit social workers from abroad.

We are maintaining the traditional professional social work courses in higher education. In addition we have funded the development of open and distant learning routes in social work to maintain a wide access gate to these professional qualifications. We also believe that the employers should be doing more to develop the skills and commitment of the nearly 900,000 staff they employ in social care and provide more of these staff with access to professional social work training.

Without wishing to take away from the employers their responsibility for their own workforce, the Government can act positively to stimulate debate among employment interests as to how best to tackle problems of recruitment and retention and to give a boost to the morale and standing of staff in the social services.

We therefore propose to host a summit meeting of all the key employment interests including employers, staff and professional associations across all sectors of social care. We intend to see employment interests put in place a positive campaign of action on the recruitment and retention issues of the whole social care workforce, not just those of professional social workers.